New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman resigned from office on Monday, hours after he was accused of non-consensual physical violence by four women.
The 63-year-old, who filed a lawsuit against Harvey Weinstein in the wake of multiple sexual harassment accusations, released a statement strongly contesting the “serious allegations,” but noted he would resign anyway, as these accusations would “effectively prevent me from leading the office’s work at this critical time.”
The allegations were detailed in a story co-written by Jane Mayer and Ronan Farrow for The New Yorker.
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Two women, Michelle Manning Barish and Tanya Selvaratnam, spoke with the magazine, saying they had been in relationships with Schneiderman, who allegedly “repeatedly hit them, often after drinking, frequently in bed and never with their consent.”
Manning Barish, who dated Schneiderman from 2013 to 2015, claims he slowly started to take steps in controlling her body, beginning with asking her to remove a tattoo from her wrist — then later evolved to full on physical abuse in the bedroom.
She recalled one intimate moment where the “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” figure backed her up to the edge of his bed and “just slapped me, open-handed and with great force, across the face, landing the blow directly onto my ear.” She added:
“It was horrendous. It just came out of nowhere. My ear was ringing. I lost my balance and fell backward onto the bed.”
Manning Barish claims Schneiderman would also hold her down with his body and choke her:
“The choking was very hard. It was really bad. I kicked. In every fiber, I felt I was being beaten by a man.”
The Democratic politician tried to brush off the allegations as “role-playing and other consensual sexual activity” in a statement on Twitter — Manning Barish, however, told The New Yorker the choking had nothing to do with sex:
“This was under no circumstances a sex game gone wrong. This did not happen while we were having sex. I was fully dressed and remained that way. It was completely unexpected and shocking. I did not consent to physical assault.”
To make matters worse, Manning Barish adds, all this was happening while Schneiderman was being commended as a champion of women in the public eye. Just a few days ago, in fact, the National Institute for Reproductive Health honored him as one of three “Champions of Choice” at its annual fundraising luncheon.
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Upon accepting the award, Schneiderman said, “If a woman cannot control her body, she is not truly equal.” But that’s far from the degrading dialogue Schneiderman would allegedly say to Manning Barish behind closed doors. She explained:
“You cannot be a champion of women when you are hitting them and choking them in bed, and saying to them, ├óΓé¼╦£You’re a fucking whore.’ ├óΓé¼┬ª This is a man who has staked his entire career, his personal narrative, on being a champion for women publicly. But he abuses them privately. He needs to be called out.”
Selvaratnam also claimed that the politician grew violent during sex, often slapping her and making sexual demands when the two were together from 2016 to 2017. She alleged:
“He was obsessed with having a threesome, and said it was my job to find a woman. He said he’d have nothing to look forward to if I didn’t and would hit me until I agreed├óΓé¼┬ª Sometimes, he’d tell me to call him Master and he’d slap me until I did.”
The author and film producer, who is Sri Lankan, added:
“He started calling me his ├óΓé¼╦£brown slave’ and demanding that I repeat that I was ├óΓé¼╦£his property.'”
Deplorable.
Two other women, who wished to remain anonymous, also made claims of sexual abuse in The New Yorker report.
Twitter was chirping with opinions after Schneiderman announced his resignation. While most agreed that his removal from office was a victory in seeing abusers removed from power, not everyone was able to do so without their own hypocrisy being pecked at.
We’re mostly talking about Kellyanne Conway, whose smug tweet about Schneiderman’s fall from grace was met with Twiticism about her defense of the most popular *alleged* sexual abuser on the planet:
Gotcha. https://t.co/a3NPal4z9X
— Kellyanne Conway (@KellyannePolls) May 8, 2018
You were the lead blocker for Mr Grab ├óΓé¼╦£Em By the Pussy, going on TV and angrily defending it as “locker room talk.” You didn├óΓé¼Γäót care about abused women then, so don├óΓé¼Γäót pretend to care now.
— Molly Knight (@molly_knight) May 8, 2018
Schneiderman’s resignation is a victory for anyone committed to seeing all abusers removed from power. For those who supported Roy Moore and continue to stand behind Donald Trump, celebrating his downfall is nothing more than ghoulish pettiness framed as moral righteousness. Bye. pic.twitter.com/rPuKcoOFt2
— Lauren Duca (@laurenduca) May 8, 2018
The selective outrage in the Trump camp at Schneiderman is a good reminder of the power of tribalism. It is the enemy of reason and morality.
To quote Orwell: “Actions are held to be good or bad, not on their own merits, but according to who does them.”
— Windsor Mann (@WindsorMann) May 8, 2018
At SOME point SOME conservative women are going to contrast and compare and go “Hmm… the other side keeps holding their creeps to account. And we don’t. Wonder what’s up with that?”. Schneiderman is not a win for Trump, it’s a warning shot across the bow. Fired by women.
— Ann Olivarius (@AnnOlivarius) May 8, 2018
Eric Schneiderman sexually abused 4 women and within hours of learning this, Democrats forced him out of his job as Attorney General of New York.@RealDonaldTrump sexually abused at least 16 women going back decades and Republicans made him “President*”
That’s the difference.
— Edan Clay 🌊 (@EdanClay) May 8, 2018
V productive, everyone!!
[Image via Ivan Nikolov/WENN.]
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